Fall Comes To Some Linden Home Neighborhoods, New Copperfield Heights Sims

 

September is when autumn comes to the temperate areas of the northern hemisphere, notably Canada, and most of the USA and Europe. And it's come to a couple Linden Home areas in Second Life:  Copperfield Heights and Aspen Ridge

 

 With the Aspen Ridge, I could see leaves falling down. 

 

Hearing some chatter in the Bellisseria group, and checking the forums, I heard there were some new sims in development in the Copperfield Heights area: Promised Pony, Masked Marvel, Paz Mundail, Cowpath Ridge, and Wind River Bluff.

 

 It is unknown when these sims will be open, but Bellisserians playing the "Game of Homes" are hopeful it will be very soon.

 

Bixyl Shuftan 

 

More Halloween Shopping And Health Island In September

Gemma Cleanslatehas been continuing her search for Halloween, and autumn, themed places. Her journey took her to two. At Wonderland Beach, there was a noteworthy hunt going on. Halloweentown was appropriately named, with spooky shops offering decore, as well as a few surprises. But this wasn't all, she would stop by Health Island to see what they had this month. 

 

Read Gemma's article in Events. 

 

Sim Total Number Growth, Slight Decline In Private Estates, Continues

 

The current number of sims is 27,735 according to the Second Life Grid Survey. That's more than the number there were at the start of the year according to an article by Daniel Voyager, 27,659. But there is one small detail with the statistics: the number of private sims.

 

As most residents know, some sims are outright owned by Linden Lab while the majority are run by private residents. At the start of the year, January 1, 2023, there were 18,370 private sims and 9289 Linden-owned sims. By July 2, the number of private sims had dipped to 18,330 and the number of Linden owned once had rose to 9360. As of the last report in November 19, the number of Linden run sims had once again risen, to 9542. But once again, the amount of private sims dropped slightly, to 18,193. 

 

So there are 177 fewer private sims and 253 more Linden-run sims than at the beginning of the year. This trend isn't necessarily a bad thing for Linden Lab. While private sims do bring in a lot of money, $210 USD a month, the Linden Home sims on Bellisseria can hold plenty of Linden Homes, and plenty of Premium residents, who pay $12 each a month. And then there's the money they spend, of which the easiest way to get is to buy Linden dollars. On the other hand, private sims can be used to create great and interesting builds, which can attract curious people to Second Life by word of mouth.

So will these trends continue? Time will tell.

Sources: Daniel Voyager's Blog, Second Life Grid Survey

Bixyl Shuftan

Grid Statistics Show Slight Increase In Total Sims, Slight Drop in Private Sim Numbers

 

 With Second Life having recently turned 20 years old, one might wonder how have the sim numbers been lately? According to an article by Daniel Voyager, based on statistics from Tyche Shepard, there's been an overall increase in the number of sims since January. But the rate different kinds has been going up has been uneven.

 

According to the article, the number of private and Linden-owned sims combined, as of July 2, is 27,690. This is 31 sims higher than the figure of 27,659 on January 1. The growth was due in part to more Linden-owned sims, notably the ones in Bellisseria, from 9289 to 9360, an increase of 71. The number of private sims shrank a little from 18,370 to 18,330, a decrease of 40.

 

Of the numbers of people getting online, there's been a slight drop. In March, the concurrency averaged from a minimum of 28,000 to a maximum of 52,000. In July 2, it had gone to an average of a minimum of 27,000 to a maximum of 49,000. Daniel commented this was no reason for worry as this fit typical tends each year of fewer residents in the summertime, and more coming in for fall and winter. 

It was stated since the start of the year, 200,000 new accounts have been created. How many are alts and how many new people stayed is unknown.

 

Source: Daniel Voyager

Bixyl Shuftan

Longing Melody

 

October is almost here. While the month is best known for Halloween, it's also known in real life for the fall season taking hold as the days start to get shorter, the summer heat fades, and trees start to change color. Gemma dropped by a location in Second Life which mirrored real life as it showed trees with changing and falling leaves and other scenery: Longing Melody. It is one of the Nature Collective areas, though hadn't been by it yet. So what did she think?

 

Read Gemma's article in Places. 

 

Cartoon of The Day: "That First Step"

Taken at May 2016
 
By Bixyl Shuftan

 

Cartoon of the Day

 

Taken at Club Zero Gravity. After a pun, this little vixen used a fainting gesture. So what could she be thinking, a popular catchphrase from the late 80s/early 90s came to mind.

By Bixyl Shuftan

 

CDS Election Update

 

On October 21, the fall elections in the Confederation of Democratic Simulators started with the call for qualified residents to announce their candidacy. Yesterday, Wednesday November 4, Delia Lake the CDS Dean posted the list of candidates.

The period for Declaration of Candidacy for the 34th Term of Government for the CDS has concluded. Our offices in government positions subject to election consists of one Chancellor and five members of the Representative Assembly (RA).

Here are our candidates
Chancellor:
Samara Barzane

RA:
1. Tanoujin Milestone
2. Almut Brunswick
3. Rosie Gray

Normally there would be a short campaign season for about a week before the polls open. But with this short list of candidates, any events wouldn't be debates.

CDS Announcment: CDS Election Dates, Autumn 2020

 

The CDS is not only a beautiful place to live but also a community of interesting people who determine how the CDS is run. We elect representatives to manage the day to day, month to month work that makes the CDS wonderful.

The citizens who run for office are our CDS friends and neighbors.  Maybe you will decide to be one of them.

A government term of office for the 5 members of the Representative Assembly (RA) and for the Chancellor is 6 months, so 2 terms a year. December 1 through May 31, and June 1 through November 30 each year.

This election starting now is the 34th term for which the CDS community will be electing representatives. Here are the relevant dates.  Watch notices for more information about our election process.

October 9: qualification deadline to run for office
    --To be a candidate for CDS office, you must be a citizen in good standing, that is you must own at least one CDS parcel in your own name and you must be current in payment of your tier.. https://cdsdemocracy.org/faqs/cdsl-16-0 ... hment-act/

October  16: qualification deadline for right to vote

October 21: announcement of the Call for Candidates

November 3:deadline for Candidate declarations to run for office

November 4: SC Dean posts list of Candidates

November 7: Candidates start campaigning

November 8: moderated Candidate debates

November 14: polls open

November 20: polls close

News and Commentary: Second Life Revenue Reportedly Down By Half In Eight Years, Number of Sims Drops Below 24K

Some troubling news was posted on the SL Universe forums by Tyche Shepard, and passed on by Hamlet Au. In Tyche's private estate survey in January, she estimated that the revenue Linden Lab makes from Second Life sim tiers had dropped to just under three million US dollars a year, or 36 million a year. Hamlet Au when seeing this information calculated that as the Lab makes about 80% of it's money from Second Life through tier payments, the rest through premium accounts, Linden dollar purchases, and fees, their total income from the virtual world was about 50 million US dollars.

While that is a lot of money, consider that in 2009 Linden Lab's income was estimated to be about 100 million dollars. This represents a drop in income of fifty percent. The Lab is making only half now what they were eight years ago.

This drop in revenue can easily be seen as an explanation for certain actions Linden Lab has taken over the past year and a half, such as reducing the set-up fees for getting sims, lowering sim tiers for a time (in exchange for a fee), and increasing the prim capacity for sims. It's also a partial explanation for why Linden Lab is making a gamble with Sansar. They're not making the money they used to.

But according to Tyche's statistics from January 2, despite the moves Linden Lab has made, the overall slow decline of the number of sims in Second Life continued throughout 2016. In the first quarter of 2017, the total number of sims dropped below 24,000. Linden Lab may very well conclude Sansar is their sole chance for stopping their revenue slide. Hamlet's earlier observation that Sansar was starting to remind him more and more of the old Blue Mars virtual world, which after less than two years was pretty much on it's way out, is not exactly an encouraging sign.

While Sansar may not be "do or die" for Linden Lab as Hamlet also suggested, it's failure would be a huge blow as it would mean a significant investment in resources would get no return, and limit the Lab's options. In the short term, it might mean more tier reductions and more advantages for premium account members as Linden Lab takes more steps to try to stop the decline. In the long term if the decline continues, the Lab may decide to let some of it's members go in a "restructuring," reduce customer service, and other steps to reduce their overhead. And if that doesn't work, well, that may be best left unmentioned.

Sources: New World Notes, SL Universe, Second Life Grid Survey

Bixyl Shuftan

Number of Second Life Users Down to 800,000, But ...

Earlier this month, Backchannel Magazine wrote about the Creations for Parkinsons area, a article that Barbie Alchemi mentioned in a press release. The article gave it's population, or user base, estimated to be at 1.1 million in 2006. In 2013, Linden Lab claimed an active user base of one million. And today, Backchannel stated "An estimated 800,000 users are active on a monthly basis," saying they were told by Linden Lab. While there are a total of almost 50 million accounts according to Daniel Voyager's Second Life Statistic's page, it's not clear how many are alt accounts.

Eight hundred thousand seems small compared to Facebook, which Backchannel stated as having close to two billion users. World of Warcraft, which came around about the same time as Second Life has sometimes been used as a comparison as to how virtual reality hadn't quite caught on the same way as massive multiplayer online games, boasted a total of 100 million accounts (in 2014) with up to over 12 million active players. But it didn't last, and it's numbers of active players dropped to 5.5 million in late 2015 when it's owners announced they would no longer be publishing reports of active numbers. It's probably safe to assume it's dropped further.

Hamlet Au suggested recently in New World Notes that this lower number of active users may not be what it seems at first. Talking with Peter Gray (Pete Linden), he was told, "We've made a number of optimizations to our user acquisition efforts to get more qualified traffic ... As a result, though the total number of monthly actives has come down, the number of paying SL users has held steady."

In layman's terms, Pete Linden says the Lab has changed their advertising to get people more likely to stay and spend time and money in Second Life. Hamlet went on to say he's felt it's more active users numbered closer to 600,000 for some years, "So most likely, dropping from 1,000,000 to 800,000 reported users isn't so much a loss of actual people as a trimming of marketing fluff."

What do you the readers think? Have you noticed fewer people coming in, or has the number of those people leaving been replaced by new users coming in?

Sourcres: Blackchannel, Daniel Voyager, New World Notes

Bixyl Shuftan

Fall Outfits

Our newest reporter, Mylie Foxclaw, has for her first official story one about fashion. With Halloween over, some ladies may be shopping for a new look this fall. Mylie has a couple of suggestions, "that look comfortable yet chic and trendy." Oh, and there's details about a Halloween hunt lasting a few more days.

Read Mylie's article in Fashion.

Pictures of the Fall Fishing Festival

Last weekend was the twice a year fishing festival by the makers of the popular 7Seas fishing game. The event was fairly straightforward, fish, fish, and fish some more. But there was no shortage of builds. So Gemma, along with Bixyl Shuftan, took a number of pictures.

See Gemma's pictures in Events.

Fall Fishing Festival

Good news for fans of 7Seas and fishing in general. The Fall Fishing Festival is coming. It promises to be a great weekend with plenty of special custom fish to catch, and interesting builds to explore around and see, as well as fish on. Fishing fan Gemma Cleanslate had a few things to say about the upcoming event.

Read Gemma's article in Events.

Second Life Statistics Show Continued Slow Decline

For some time, the total amount of privately held land in Second Life has been in a slow decline, and the most recent statistics from The Second Life Grid Survey show the trend continuing.

The latest numbers show the number of private sims to be 26,403. In the SL Universe forums, Tyche Shepherd stated this was a loss of 1568 since the start of the year, or 7.5%. While not as big a decline as last year's 2500, it's still not good news. Daniel Voyager estimated at this rate, the total would drop to about 24,000 in a year.

Hamlet Au had two things to say about this development. One was that the declining tier revenue was being partially made up by Blocksworld and other aps owned by Linden Lab outside Second Life. Should tier continue to fall, the Lab will depend more on it as a source of revenue. The second was a reminder to readers not to expect tier rates to fall, and that was no solution to Second Life's shrinking land area. If for no other reason most virtual property was in the hands of a handful of land barons, whom are doing fairly well. A drop in tier, Hamlet felt, would just mean a severe drop in revenue from Second Life. To stop Second Life from shrinking, Hamlet argued, the Lab needs to find a way for it to attract more new users. Hamlet got a number of suggestions from readers about how the lab could, though they were skeptical about the Lab's willingness, and competence to do so.


So can Second Life turn around, or will the slow shrinkage continue?

Source: Second Life Grid Survey

Bixyl Shuftan

Cartoon of the Day

By Bixyl Shuftan

Fall Fishing Festival Screenshots

This weekend, Gemma spent some time at the 7Seas' Fall Fishing Festival.  Having earlier sent a story to tell about it just as it was starting, she sent a number of pictures as the weekend went on. 

Read more in Events.

7Seas Fall Fishing Festival

For the players of the popular 7Seas fishing game, the twice a year event all about rods and reels is on it's way: the 7Seas Fall Fishing Festival. Sit down in one of the many fishing shacks, or take a boat out. Or you can head out to the party island. The event's for a good cause too. Some special items will be auctioned off for a childrens' charity.

Read more in Events.

Thanksgiving at Areo Pines Park (Full Article)

This Thanksgiving season, Areo Pines Park has been having some fun with it's annual Pow Wow. Starting on November 16th, the sims have been the scene of parties and dancing around, in addition to some canoeing and the horseback riding the sim has every day.

Read more in Places.

Events This Week in Second Life from Nov 20 to Nov 26

This week in Second Life, thoughts turn to Thanksgiving and fall festivities. Areo Pines and Tribute City are among those having tributes to the American holiday of turkey dinners and autumn. Besides the holiday events, look for regularly scheduled happenings of live music and DJ parties, book and poetry readings, races, church services, and talk shows.

See more in Events this Week.